PHILADELPHIA – Oooooo, six inches of snow. Oooooo, I’m scared. Better call off the game and call in the National Guard. Heck, in Minnesota we dump six inches of snow out of our socks at the end of the day.

What’s going on with the NFL, anyway? Didn’t the Vikings and Chicago Bears just play in a snowstorm at TCF Bank Stadium? Apparently, the league has become so sterile, so TV oriented that it now makes decisions based on precipitation. Suddenly, games are being postponed left and right.

At first, the predicted snowfall and high winds appeared to be huge breaks for the down-and-out Vikings. A bad field would limit the mobility of Eagles quarterback Michael Vick. Plus, wind gusts would affect the Philadelphia Eagles’ high-powered passing game much more than it would affect the puny passing game of the Vikings.

But here’s the thing: Vick likely is the leading candidate for MVP. An Eagles’ victory over the Vikings could clinch a playoff spot, too. Combined, those factors make for good television. Playing in weather that fails to showcase Vick and the Eagles does not. So there’s my conspiracy theory for today, and I’m sticking to it.

Now the Vikings sit and stew in their hotel rooms while the Eagles remain home with their families. Maybe Leslie Frazier will have a walkthrough in the hotel lobby, just like Bud Grant used to do. But it is clear that as they come to the tail end of a miserable season, they are experiencing one more kick in the behind.

Meanwhile, I’m looking out my window here in Philly late Sunday afternoon, and I see plows going by on the highway. Traffic is moving. Are Philly fans more brittle or accident prone than Vikings fans? I don’t think so.

The worst part is that the league is postponing the game until Tuesday instead of playing it Monday. That is a decision based entirely on the wishes of network television. And it shows total disregard for everyone else. The forecast doesn’t even call for snow Monday night.

Vikings fans who flew here for the game – and my flight was loaded with them – are hosed. Either they stick with their original flight and hotel reservations and head back Monday without seeing a game, or they extend their stay, which would be very expensive. Neither option seems particularly inviting.

But ESPN has exclusivity for Monday night telecasts. And the postponement means that NBC loses its nationally televised Sunday night game. ESPN recently agreed to allow Fox to televise the Vikings-Giants game, which was moved to Monday night in Detroit because of the Metrodome roof collapse, to those teams’ local markets. The word is that ESPN is not about to undercut its own ratings again. It wants everyone’s full attention on its Monday night matchup between the New Orleans Saints and Atlanta Falcons.

So NBC gets to televise the Vikings-Eagles on Tuesday. Meanwhile, the league insists the game was moved to Tuesday to allow “sufficient time” for snow cleanup. That’s just a flat-out lie. It’s to keep ESPN and NBC happy.

Of course, if they simply had played at the original time, which was 1 p.m. Sunday, there wouldn’t have been a problem. But last week, there appeared to be a juicier ratings opportunity by switching the Vikings-Eagles to a night game. So in this case, greed didn’t pay. At least not right away.

The game was not “flexed” to evening because of the Vikings, who are out of the running and uninteresting to everyone outside of Minnesota. (And to many who reside in Minnesota, too.) It’s just that Vick is being touted as the potential MVP, and the Eagles still are chasing a playoff berth.

A victory over the Vikings could clinch that playoff berth. Plus, under normal circumstances, Vick certainly would have put up big numbers against a faltering Minnesota defense. The conditions Sunday proved less than ideal. So everything shifted, and showcase opportunities were preserved.

And I’m sure Philly football fans slept well Sunday night knowing that the NFL was worried about their safety.

Tom Powers can be reached at tpowers@pioneerpress.com.

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